Joe Brolly

[Angelo]

By the Free State I refer to those who represent the state, the government officials, the state media, the figureheads. There needs to be an acknowledgement and contrition of their cowardice and treachery, they need to stop the "but the IRA" everytime they are reminded of their GFA commitments. They need to stop revising history and finally accept they completely failed northern nationalists and those who defend the Free State revisionism are as bad.

Until the establishment of the SDLP, northern nationalist leadership.was appalling .

Also blowing people up.was a bad look.
Stop blaming everything on the south.

Apologise and take some responsibility.

[Itchy]

Angelo,

On behalf of the entire "freestate" I would like to apologise to you for everything.

Regards,
Freestate government, media, etc over the past 100 yrs
pp Itchy


Hopefully we can move on now

[Angelo]

The "I hate Free Staters" mob are basically Ian O'Doherty, Eoghan Harris and Ruth Dudley Edwards repackaged in green

The lot of them should be banished to a windswept island off the Atlantic coast where they can bitch at each other like Ted Crilly and Dick Byrne

Ah you're projecting now and actually parroting my accurate summations of your illogical and emotional Eoghan Harris type diatribes. Just like Eoghan Harris you can't leave emotion one side. This bit of Brolly's article hits the nail on the head from me when it comes to Free State revisionism on The Troubles:

When the Peace Agreement was signed, the DUP rejected it, then destroyed David Trimble (painting him as a traitor to Ulster) and progressive unionism. As soon as that was done, Paisley U-turned and became First Minister. In spite of the DUP, we are enjoying the most spectacularly successful peace process in modern history. They have had an opportunity in the 25 years since to create a stable Northern Ireland, but they couldn't. This is because they are not so much a political party as an emotion.

As historian Brendan O'Leary explains in his masterwork on the North, the North is not a state, or even a province. It is instead an unworkable fantasy based on unionist supremacy. A ragbag of a place whose raison d'etre has always been to rub the Catholics' noses in it. We have lived through systematic discrimination, electoral fraud, deprivation of the vote, violent repression of civil rights, shoot to kill, massacres of innocent civilians without consequence (Bloody Sunday, Glenanne, Ballymurphy) and so on. If children in the Republic were taught that in 1971, thousands of Catholic men were rounded up and detained in a detention camp outside Belfast without charge or trial for up to three years, they would think you were joking. Doesn't that only happen in Russia?

In 1976, after a music night at the Bellaghy club, my parents and a few friends, including my Aunt Maura, who was on the lookout for a man at the time, were stopped by a UDR patrol. My father was taken over the hill out of sight and three shots rang out. Then Packie Kealey (a fiddler). Then Lawrence Mulholland. When car lights appeared on the horizon, the soldiers got back in their Land Rover and drove off. My Aunt Maura said: "Your mother was heavily pregnant with Aine. We ran over the hill in hysterics. We thought they were dead. They were all alive. Just badly beaten." Subsequently, the men were awarded £5,000 in damages at Magherafelt District Court. No one was ever charged. This was normal life for us.

The Republic turned a blind eye. As writer and historian Paul Larkin put it recently, the only explanation for the hysterical Southern response to anyone talking honestly about the North "is self shame - a phenomenon well attested in post-colonial societies". It is a sense of guilt that comes from them having sat on their hands as the horrors unfolded. Much easier to blame Sinn Féin and the IRA than to call out the root causes.

Hard to disagree with any of that. The Free State had all the time in the world to do something positive for the north but the same sense of entitlement that saw it for them to sell out the 6 counties in the 1920s existed then and still exists today. Acknowledgement and contrition for that really needs to be forthcoming.

[APM]

Some uncomfortable truths for some free staters there who feel they have a right to pontificate and moralise on the north. Before they do that maybe some acknowledgement and contrition for the contempt they have show northern natioanlists over the past 50 years might be in order.

I have noticed some people, who I would normally regard as sensible and proportionate on the national question (even while arguing their own strongly held views), have been inclined lately to lose the run of themselves, play the man and descend into stereotyping.  People are getting very hot under the collar. 

You seem to be perpetually hot under the collar on a number of issues, but I've one question for you. 

You clearly have serious contempt for those in the south that you perceive to have sold out the North, either through the actions of their forefathers or their disinterest since.  If you want to achieve a UI you will need more than half of the southern population to be on board. We have seen that some are against a UI.  Some people on the south will be sitting on the fence.  Others will have a heart leaning towards a UI and a head leaning to the Status Quo.  Some people with a vote will be the "new Irish" who will not have a clue what you are on about, only that you come across like a zealot.

Do you think your comments persuade people sitting on the fence in the south that a United Ireland is worth it?

Do you want to rewrite. The contempt is not with me.

The contempt is with the Free State Establishment. Brolly's article touches on it there, for the past 50 years the free state establishment has shown nothing but contempt for the plight of the northern nationalist. It's about time some acknowledgement and contrition was shown, it's about time they owned up to their role in the troubles, that they were happy to be an onlooker to sectarianism, discrimination, violence and oppression that was foisted upon the northern nationalists.

I don't have to convince anyone. The demographics will do that, they are changing on both sides of the border. The young generation of the south have been foisted with a national debt by the establishment parties because they want to look after vested interest, a housing crisis is in place for the same reason, a dysfunctional two-tier health system is in place for the same reason.

I don't have to lower myself to be an Uncle Tom type figure who tries to swallow the disrespect and and contempt the Free State has shown us over the past 50 years and continues to insults nationalist victims of The Troubles by pulling up the IRA at every turn. I going to call out that despicable gaslighting and insulting behaviour for what it is. Any decent minded individual would acknowledge that the conduct of FF and FG in the past decade on legacy issues with The Troubles has been disgraceful.

You might want to show deference and beg those vile cretins to let us in but I want nothing to do with the sectarian culture fostered in the north and the elitist corrupt culture fostered in the south. We need a new Ireland, we have two failed states either side of the border and it's not for me to convince people, the negative issues on both sides of the border and the change in demographics and pulling this down one road and that's a United Ireland.

So maybe drop your pious attitude. If you want to defend Free State politicians and institution goading victims of The Troubles and their families then that's your prerogative but you won't ever hear me say anything positive about The Free State establishment as respect is a two way street and they've never even had the decency to acknowledge their betrayal and inaction.

Do you really expect everyone to examine the question of Ireland's future through the same lens as you?

Like it or not, your views fit somewhere on a spectrum of views on a UI and those views reflect different life experiences. There will be many with similar views to you, but there are many that won't.  Your answer is that you don't have to convince anyone. You probably don't; but those politically advocating for a UI cannot ignore the diversity of opinion on a matter like this and judging from the Clare Byrne programme, I don't think the political leaders will. 

Even if the demographics are on the side of unity, you have to think of what comes next. If it is not an inclusive approach it will fail, perhaps doomed to make some of the same mistakes previously made post-partition. 

It's one thing to ignore those with different options; it's another thing entirely to insult those with different opinions. Your choice of language is ugly:
Uncle Toms; despicable gaslighting; vile cretins; betrayal

This isn't the language of winning hearts and minds; which is ultimately what is required. 

There is nothing pious about that - it is just common sense. 

[Applesisapples]

Dear southern brothers, do not take Angelo as speaking for northern nationalism. His pathetic instance in call the state the free state is to get a rise. The only people I hear calling it the Freestate now are loyalists using it in a derogatory manner.

[Angelo]

Some uncomfortable truths for some free staters there who feel they have a right to pontificate and moralise on the north. Before they do that maybe some acknowledgement and contrition for the contempt they have show northern natioanlists over the past 50 years might be in order.

I have noticed some people, who I would normally regard as sensible and proportionate on the national question (even while arguing their own strongly held views), have been inclined lately to lose the run of themselves, play the man and descend into stereotyping.  People are getting very hot under the collar. 

You seem to be perpetually hot under the collar on a number of issues, but I've one question for you. 

You clearly have serious contempt for those in the south that you perceive to have sold out the North, either through the actions of their forefathers or their disinterest since.  If you want to achieve a UI you will need more than half of the southern population to be on board. We have seen that some are against a UI.  Some people on the south will be sitting on the fence.  Others will have a heart leaning towards a UI and a head leaning to the Status Quo.  Some people with a vote will be the "new Irish" who will not have a clue what you are on about, only that you come across like a zealot.

Do you think your comments persuade people sitting on the fence in the south that a United Ireland is worth it?

Do you want to rewrite. The contempt is not with me.

The contempt is with the Free State Establishment. Brolly's article touches on it there, for the past 50 years the free state establishment has shown nothing but contempt for the plight of the northern nationalist. It's about time some acknowledgement and contrition was shown, it's about time they owned up to their role in the troubles, that they were happy to be an onlooker to sectarianism, discrimination, violence and oppression that was foisted upon the northern nationalists.

I don't have to convince anyone. The demographics will do that, they are changing on both sides of the border. The young generation of the south have been foisted with a national debt by the establishment parties because they want to look after vested interest, a housing crisis is in place for the same reason, a dysfunctional two-tier health system is in place for the same reason.

I don't have to lower myself to be an Uncle Tom type figure who tries to swallow the disrespect and and contempt the Free State has shown us over the past 50 years and continues to insults nationalist victims of The Troubles by pulling up the IRA at every turn. I going to call out that despicable gaslighting and insulting behaviour for what it is. Any decent minded individual would acknowledge that the conduct of FF and FG in the past decade on legacy issues with The Troubles has been disgraceful.

You might want to show deference and beg those vile cretins to let us in but I want nothing to do with the sectarian culture fostered in the north and the elitist corrupt culture fostered in the south. We need a new Ireland, we have two failed states either side of the border and it's not for me to convince people, the negative issues on both sides of the border and the change in demographics and pulling this down one road and that's a United Ireland.

So maybe drop your pious attitude. If you want to defend Free State politicians and institution goading victims of The Troubles and their families then that's your prerogative but you won't ever hear me say anything positive about The Free State establishment as respect is a two way street and they've never even had the decency to acknowledge their betrayal and inaction.

Do you really expect everyone to examine the question of Ireland's future through the same lens as you?

Like it or not, your views fit somewhere on a spectrum of views on a UI and those views reflect different life experiences. There will be many with similar views to you, but there are many that won't.  Your answer is that you don't have to convince anyone. You probably don't; but those politically advocating for a UI cannot ignore the diversity of opinion on a matter like this and judging from the Clare Byrne programme, I don't think the political leaders will. 

Even if the demographics are on the side of unity, you have to think of what comes next. If it is not an inclusive approach it will fail, perhaps doomed to make some of the same mistakes previously made post-partition. 

It's one thing to ignore those with different options; it's another thing entirely to insult those with different opinions. Your choice of language is ugly:
Uncle Toms; despicable gaslighting; vile cretins; betrayal

This isn't the language of winning hearts and minds; which is ultimately what is required. 

There is nothing pious about that - it is just common sense.

I'm not going to sugarcoat my words.

What you're about as much related to common sense as the DUP's rhetoric, what you want to do is the SDLP philosophy, lick the unionist boot, kiss the Free State ring.

f**k that, deference never served any northern nationalist any good.

This is a great chance to consign two failed states to the bin and your mantra is that we should bow down and show homage to the biggest obstacles to it which are the dinosaur unionist politics of the DUP/UUP and the intransigent Free State elite policies of FFG. They have zero interest in a United Ireland, they have zero interest on losing the vice like grip on power and institutions they have both sides of the border. That is the truth and that is common sense.

A United Ireland will happen in spite of these people and not from winning them around because fundamentally they have shown time and time again when talks and aims of United Ireland are advanced they try and pour cold water on them.

Brolly's point was you can't call unionism what it is without censure. When you have Colum "I'll stop Brexit" Eastwood going around liking tweets from FG politicians that defend the DUP it really says it all.

[Angelo]

Dear southern brothers, do not take Angelo as speaking for northern nationalism. His pathetic instance in call the state the free state is to get a rise. The only people I hear calling it the Freestate now are loyalists using it in a derogatory manner.

Dear posters.

Please do not take this unionist bootlicker to speak for any republican on this island.

End of message.

I come from a Republican area, we call it the Free State.

[6th sam]

The "I hate Free Staters" mob are basically Ian O'Doherty, Eoghan Harris and Ruth Dudley Edwards repackaged in green

The lot of them should be banished to a windswept island off the Atlantic coast where they can bitch at each other like Ted Crilly and Dick Byrne

Ah you're projecting now and actually parroting my accurate summations of your illogical and emotional Eoghan Harris type diatribes. Just like Eoghan Harris you can't leave emotion one side. This bit of Brolly's article hits the nail on the head from me when it comes to Free State revisionism on The Troubles:

When the Peace Agreement was signed, the DUP rejected it, then destroyed David Trimble (painting him as a traitor to Ulster) and progressive unionism. As soon as that was done, Paisley U-turned and became First Minister. In spite of the DUP, we are enjoying the most spectacularly successful peace process in modern history. They have had an opportunity in the 25 years since to create a stable Northern Ireland, but they couldn't. This is because they are not so much a political party as an emotion.

As historian Brendan O'Leary explains in his masterwork on the North, the North is not a state, or even a province. It is instead an unworkable fantasy based on unionist supremacy. A ragbag of a place whose raison d'etre has always been to rub the Catholics' noses in it. We have lived through systematic discrimination, electoral fraud, deprivation of the vote, violent repression of civil rights, shoot to kill, massacres of innocent civilians without consequence (Bloody Sunday, Glenanne, Ballymurphy) and so on. If children in the Republic were taught that in 1971, thousands of Catholic men were rounded up and detained in a detention camp outside Belfast without charge or trial for up to three years, they would think you were joking. Doesn't that only happen in Russia?

In 1976, after a music night at the Bellaghy club, my parents and a few friends, including my Aunt Maura, who was on the lookout for a man at the time, were stopped by a UDR patrol. My father was taken over the hill out of sight and three shots rang out. Then Packie Kealey (a fiddler). Then Lawrence Mulholland. When car lights appeared on the horizon, the soldiers got back in their Land Rover and drove off. My Aunt Maura said: "Your mother was heavily pregnant with Aine. We ran over the hill in hysterics. We thought they were dead. They were all alive. Just badly beaten." Subsequently, the men were awarded £5,000 in damages at Magherafelt District Court. No one was ever charged. This was normal life for us.

The Republic turned a blind eye. As writer and historian Paul Larkin put it recently, the only explanation for the hysterical Southern response to anyone talking honestly about the North "is self shame - a phenomenon well attested in post-colonial societies". It is a sense of guilt that comes from them having sat on their hands as the horrors unfolded. Much easier to blame Sinn Féin and the IRA than to call out the root causes.

Hard to disagree with any of that. The Free State had all the time in the world to do something positive for the north but the same sense of entitlement that saw it for them to sell out the 6 counties in the 1920s existed then and still exists today. Acknowledgement and contrition for that really needs to be forthcoming.

Much as I don't agree with Angelo's approach on a number of issues , and antagonism towards "the freestate" is counterproductive, ROI politicians and media in the main have little insight or empathy for the North. Ironically many appear to have more affinity and respect for DUP types than the Irish in the North. FF have had a few exceptions , Albert , and even Charlie and Bertie🤦🏻‍♂️ , whilst Coveney and Peter Barry were the only FG politicians who appeared to have any concern for the Irish in the North.

Angelo , will no doubt be shot down with vigour, as usual , but I would genuinely agree that many in ROI need to reflect on neglect of their fellow countrymen, standing idly by for the first 50 years of horrendous discrimination in NI, and in the last 50 years failing to confront the continuing supremacy of many DUP politicians and their followers . Their vigorous condemnation of IRA atrocities ( and rightly so ) if not matched by calling out unionist supremacy , and trying better to understand the Irish in the North, (as opposed to treating us with disdain), comes across as party political.

[Angelo]

The "I hate Free Staters" mob are basically Ian O'Doherty, Eoghan Harris and Ruth Dudley Edwards repackaged in green

The lot of them should be banished to a windswept island off the Atlantic coast where they can bitch at each other like Ted Crilly and Dick Byrne

Ah you're projecting now and actually parroting my accurate summations of your illogical and emotional Eoghan Harris type diatribes. Just like Eoghan Harris you can't leave emotion one side. This bit of Brolly's article hits the nail on the head from me when it comes to Free State revisionism on The Troubles:

When the Peace Agreement was signed, the DUP rejected it, then destroyed David Trimble (painting him as a traitor to Ulster) and progressive unionism. As soon as that was done, Paisley U-turned and became First Minister. In spite of the DUP, we are enjoying the most spectacularly successful peace process in modern history. They have had an opportunity in the 25 years since to create a stable Northern Ireland, but they couldn't. This is because they are not so much a political party as an emotion.

As historian Brendan O'Leary explains in his masterwork on the North, the North is not a state, or even a province. It is instead an unworkable fantasy based on unionist supremacy. A ragbag of a place whose raison d'etre has always been to rub the Catholics' noses in it. We have lived through systematic discrimination, electoral fraud, deprivation of the vote, violent repression of civil rights, shoot to kill, massacres of innocent civilians without consequence (Bloody Sunday, Glenanne, Ballymurphy) and so on. If children in the Republic were taught that in 1971, thousands of Catholic men were rounded up and detained in a detention camp outside Belfast without charge or trial for up to three years, they would think you were joking. Doesn't that only happen in Russia?

In 1976, after a music night at the Bellaghy club, my parents and a few friends, including my Aunt Maura, who was on the lookout for a man at the time, were stopped by a UDR patrol. My father was taken over the hill out of sight and three shots rang out. Then Packie Kealey (a fiddler). Then Lawrence Mulholland. When car lights appeared on the horizon, the soldiers got back in their Land Rover and drove off. My Aunt Maura said: "Your mother was heavily pregnant with Aine. We ran over the hill in hysterics. We thought they were dead. They were all alive. Just badly beaten." Subsequently, the men were awarded £5,000 in damages at Magherafelt District Court. No one was ever charged. This was normal life for us.

The Republic turned a blind eye. As writer and historian Paul Larkin put it recently, the only explanation for the hysterical Southern response to anyone talking honestly about the North "is self shame - a phenomenon well attested in post-colonial societies". It is a sense of guilt that comes from them having sat on their hands as the horrors unfolded. Much easier to blame Sinn Féin and the IRA than to call out the root causes.

Hard to disagree with any of that. The Free State had all the time in the world to do something positive for the north but the same sense of entitlement that saw it for them to sell out the 6 counties in the 1920s existed then and still exists today. Acknowledgement and contrition for that really needs to be forthcoming.

Much as I don't agree with Angelo's approach on a number of issues , and antagonism towards "the freestate" is counterproductive, ROI politicians and media in the main have little insight or empathy for the North. Ironically many appear to have more affinity and respect for DUP types than the Irish in the North. FF have had a few exceptions , Albert , and even Charlie and Bertie🤦🏻‍♂️ , whilst Coveney and Peter Barry were the only FG politicians who appeared to have any concern for the Irish in the North.

Angelo , will no doubt be shot down with vigour, as usual , but I would genuinely agree that many in ROI need to reflect on neglect of their fellow countrymen, standing idly for the first 50 years of horrendous discrimination in NI, and failing to confront the continuing supremacy of many DUP politicians and their followers . Their vigorous condemnation of IRA atrocities ( and rightly so ) if not matched by calling out unionist supremacy , and trying better to understand the Irish in the North, (as opposed to treating us with disdain), comes across as party political.

Thank you.

[Rossfan]

Who do the narrow minded extremists think they are going to unite with ?
It may be a wet dream for them to imagine all of Ireland being turned into a one party  South Armagh* like Sinn Féin Socialist Republic.
The 98% who live in the real world (incl most of SF) won't be having that.

*Apologies to any South Armagh people but I had to pick somewhere.

[Angelo]

People like Rossfan are clutching to any hope they have of partition being retained.

Thankfully for us all, dinosaurs like Rossfan belong in the same category of the DUP and the demographics are making their views and votes more and more obsolete.

It's going to happen and all those vociferous and aggressive partitionists like Rossfan and Gregory Campbell can't do a jot about it.

[Applesisapples]

Dear southern brothers, do not take Angelo as speaking for northern nationalism. His pathetic instance in call the state the free state is to get a rise. The only people I hear calling it the Freestate now are loyalists using it in a derogatory manner.

Dear posters.

Please do not take this unionist bootlicker to speak for any republican on this island.

End of message.

I come from a Republican area, we call it the Free State.

Says it all when insults are the only answer you have.

[6th sam]

Who do the narrow minded extremists think they are going to unite with ?
It may be a wet dream for them to imagine all of Ireland being turned into a one party  South Armagh* like Sinn Féin Socialist Republic.
The 98% who live in the real world (incl most of SF) won't be having that.

*Apologies to any South Armagh people but I had to pick somewhere.

I respect your view Rossfan, but I don't fit into above category and I don't know of any other Irish in the north that do, and herein lies the problem I alluded to. Many in ROI have little or no insight understanding or empathy for the Irish in the North. It suits many to paint us as a cantankerous rabble ( though Angelo doesn't do much to counter that view😂) rather than actively engage with us in tackling DUP supremacy which remains the biggest barrier to progress on this island.

[Angelo]

Dear southern brothers, do not take Angelo as speaking for northern nationalism. His pathetic instance in call the state the free state is to get a rise. The only people I hear calling it the Freestate now are loyalists using it in a derogatory manner.

Dear posters.

Please do not take this unionist bootlicker to speak for any republican on this island.

End of message.

I come from a Republican area, we call it the Free State.

Says it all when insults are the only answer you have.

The irony of this post.

[Angelo]

My focus would be on eradicating two failed states on this island that promote elitism and supremacy for the well heeled.

So I don't really care what those elitists (FF/FG and their voting pool) or the supremacists (DUP/UUP) have to contribute to these matters. They have sinister vested interests for retaining the status quo, they are not going to be engaged with. It's the others who want to bring an end to the end two failed states, who are somewhat flexible in their viewpoints that will decide this.

Not your Gregory Campbells or Rossfans.